What is or has been your worst drug addiction?

[Nagognog2]

Councilors/therapists who use the word 'denial' are still reading the old scripts from the AA playlist. It was all about invoking guilt to force the person to change by means of psychological warfare.

More in line with rational approaches to addiction is to look for "Blind Spots" in the person's understanding and provide educational material to allow the person to make an informed decision. Rather than guilt-tripping the individual while beating them over the head with a Bible.

Reputation Comments on this post:

well said

[Pinkavvy]

It's hard to answer the question which addiction is worse. Swip abused meth very badly for a couple years, which caused the most havoc to his life. However, there was no physical dependancy to it. The worse physical dependancy swip has encountered was from Oxycodone. (even worse than heroin or fenanyl for swip.)

[violentcheetah]

The one that hurt SWIM(not an amateur) was benzos and focalin, just over 3 years. Ran out a bit early and ended up in the hospital. Ugh, just effin horrible. Up and down and round and round. Swim will let ya know how it turns out.

[cyndi]

Oh swiy has the double whammy. He is not alone believe me. If swiy wants to truly kick, he would have to kick both as one will take him back to the other. Vicious cycle swim says again. Yeah drinking, doping and cigs sort of go hand in hand. Most addicts/alcoholics smoke too that swim knows. People that know swim are shocked that swim doesn't smoke. It just always made her feel sick.

Yeah if swim could chose two, it would be the benzos and meth. Swim likes the benzos too much lately.

[Geeza]

Swim hasn't really had a proper addiction. He thinks he is more prone to psychological addiction than physical addiction. He used to smoke a pack of fags each weekend and found that quitting smoking was the easiest thing he had ever done.

Yet he finds life without MJ very boring, and when he stopped doing E for some important exams he thought about them every day and really fiended for them.

So swim's worst addiction would be MJ although he is not actually addicted. It's just that not doing it ever again would be difficult as it is so easy to obtain.
But swim's worst withdrawal would be XTC as it is emotionally painful to give up.

But come to think of it, Swim's worst addiction would be nail-biting. That shit's IMPOSSIBLE to give up! :P

[ISmokeCigarettes]

Swim voted alcohol because…


NICOTINE:
Swim (as a smoker) believes nicotine IS more addictive, BUT is a lesser addiction. Nicotine has mild physical withdrawal and is an easily manageable and more socially accepted addiction, it has less stigma surrounding it and it is more an inconvenience than a life threatening condition (in comparison to other drug addictions).

COCAINE / CRACK:
Swim has never liked or found any appeal in coke (in any form) so that option didn’t apply, to Swim.

SPEED:
Swim has been through speed addiction and although it isn’t easy, Swim has found alcohol withdrawal and abstinence far harder and far more violent, though the psychosis and paranoia Swim experienced towards the height of Swim’s speed use was complete lunacy and Swim cant (even now) separate half of the delusions Swim had from the reality at the time. Swim found alcohol more addictive, partly, because of the lesser adverse mental effects (for Swim personally) and alcohols near unlimited accessibility.

HALLUCINOGENS:
Swim doesn’t understand how anyone can become addicted to most hallucinogens (though Swim is not saying people cant). All the hallucinogens Swim has encountered cannot create physical dependence (e.g. acid) and so the only dependence which can form is psychological which is, by definition, all in the mind…rendering humans capable of being addicted to sucking shoe laces. Swim, personally, understands ’addiction’ through the presence of both psychological AND physical dependence.

CANNABIS:
Weed falls into the same category as hallucinogens, for Swim. Swim smoked grass / skunk everyday for years and never experienced even mild psychological dependence, or craving.

OPIATES:
Opiates are a different story. Swim spent years addicted to codeine and various opiate based pain killers and went through withdrawal and allsorts of processes (when the doctor refused to script more) to get them. Swim also used heroin, eventually daily and then went cold turkey. Swim found heroin a lot more addictive (the drug itself) than alcohol, but found heroin easier to overcome than alcohol, both physically and psychological. Swim believes if alcohol and heroin had the same social and legal status and were both accepted and legal that heroin would, as a drug, be more addictive, BUT because of alcohol is socially accepted and much more easily (and legally) attainable (and thus harder to avoid) that alcohol is easier to and ensure constant accessibility that alcohol is harder to kick and easier to fall into in the first place, for the vast majority. Swim included.

ECSTACY:
Swim struggles to see how ecstasy / mdma is addictive as mdma itself has an inbuilt defence against addiction. Tolerance builds up rapidly and after prolonged use mdma becomes entirely ineffective. Swim used mdma very often and eventually became totally unable to even come up. It took over eight months before ecstasy even touched the sides again, for Swim.

(Finally…)BENZOS:
Swim, again, used valium and tamazi for prolonged periods and Swim’s mate has been hospitalised on and off since she was 13 due to benzo addiction, but Swim never found benzos that addictive. Benzos get boring quickly and tolerance grows rapidly. The social side of using benzos dies out too soon and so did much of the appeal. Even though heroin tolerance can grow rapidly there remains a certain twisted enjoyment in the community and specialist knowledge shared between users…this never seems to happen with benzos. Benzos make a person turn into a hermit, and though this may mean they are more addictive for some as everything else (social interaction etc) disappears, Swim personally found so did benzo’s appeal.

Lol So ‘in conclusion’ Swim finds alcohol the most addictive, over all. Alcohol withdrawal is damn terrifying.

[frenchywife]

Cocaine/Crack, specifically crack. Next on the list is nicotine. Although it's hard to say which is worse, for SWIM's addiction to cigarettes has been for a much longer period of time, and is more habitual.

However, SWIM's addiction to cocaine/crack has had more severe and devastating consequences and although the abuse was short-lived, it was extremely intense.

SWIM is happy to report that crack is no longer an addiction, cocaine on the other hand is a whole other story. However, SWIM would like to make clear that she does not consider herself a coke addict, rather she is a recreational user with abusive tendencies - does this make sense?

[is_today_monday]

Opiates/oids

SWIM has been addicted to a variety of opioids for a while now, starting with codeine way back when, and climbing up the ladder to a heroin/morphine addiction. The results of this addiction had devastating results, not only in monetary value/legal issues/loss of friendships, but just the self degradation SWIM feels when she falls off the opioid wagon.

On the other hand, SWIM has also experienced long and severe amphetamine addiction in the past - purely psychological, but just as devastating, especially in legal issues - SWIM finds herself more reckless and ignorant of rules and laws when on a long gear (speed) binge. All of this finally resulted in a severe amphetamine psychosis.

SWIM has been off the gear now for two months, apart from one incident. However, the struggles with opiate addiction are just as bad, prompting signing up to the 'sponsored addiction clinic' for Suboxone maintenance treatment. The latter is definitely SWIM's worst addiction.

[dogzz]

Swim has used and abused everything except heroin, was able to quit them all without any problem except for meth...No matter how badly swim wanted to quit, no matter how long and hard swim tried meth always won out. Swim finally upped and moved away from all friends, connections, anything and everything to do with the past, Luckily moved to where there seems to be practically no meth. would have 3 years clean now, except for a trip back to where swim lived before and what a surprise!!! had to use again. So it's 2 years clean now.

[dogzz]

and no, the trip back was not for the sole purpose of using. Had the intention of not using.....went back for a funeral.

[Graduisic]

swim chose 'other' because there wasn't an 'all of the above'. each addiction has given swim a different, and permanent, even after quitting, effect on his life.

DXM has given swim a huge boost in creativity; music and DXM have some form of amazing synergy in his mind. It has hindered his social interaction ability, permanently altered my brain chemestry, and sometimes he has trouble with speech. His addiction peaked freshman year of college; during second semester, he spent nearly every day taking at least 900mg, rarely leaving his room. he had to drop out; even though he got A's and B's, there were other psychological issues he had to deal with. He quit DXM for good two weeks ago when he had a psychotic break during a comedown from a 1500mg trip (probably due to serotonin syndrome).

Nicotine was a sleeper drug for swim. he's smoke a cig now and then, and once college started, it became a full-blown habit. Since then, it has been a battle to try and quit.

Coke and amphetamines (adderall in particular) became a very strong dependant for swim in high school. he used to get adderall, d-amphetamine, and adderall xr 25 mg pills for free from various people. it became a daily habit; sometimes he'd have to pay to support it and since he wasn't paying to eat lunch, he just tweaked some more. senior year he came to terms with his dependancy after many of his friends got busted for pushing these pills. junior year was filled with activity and was probably the most academically stimulating time of my life because of the adderall, but it left me unable to do anything whenever he was without it. eventually, a tolerance built up and the euphoria went away; the desire to do anything productive went away. it brought about obsessive-compulsive behavior and paranoia, he quit taking it for many years and now takes it occasionally when he needs a serious extra boost.

Marijuana daily for almost 6 years and it has never affected how he functions on a day-to-day basis, as long as its used during the evening when the day is over. He used to smoke in the early morning before going to school. His work ethic and overall presentation of himself suffered greatly as a result.

Benzos (particularly xanax) were abused constantly; it used to be a self-medicating habit to deal with extreme anxiety, now he has gone to his doctor, been diagnosed with anxiety disorder and has a scrip for them.

Vicodin, oxycontin, and morphine used to be drugs that swim would crave so horribly that he would resort to stealing and hurting people he cared about.

Swim never had a problem with habituation with MDMA or hallucinogens, but all of the above drugs are still addictions he must fight to keep down. As of two weeks ago after that DXM-related psychotic break, he is slowly and carefully easing himself away from his dependencies, so that maybe one day he can enjoy drugs as recreation, not as a crutch.

[Pino]

Marijuana was one of the most difficult to break. Almost everyone in swims group of friends used it. However swim has stopped with it and swim has learned, what the word "group pressure" means.

Nicotine is easy to break, but not forever. Swim uses snuff for a month then he stops for a couple of months and then he starts again. Nicotine is easy to start and it is easy to break.

Swim also find it difficult to completely stop drinking alcohol. Very difficult. The same reason as with marijuana; most of swims friends drink. Swim experimented a bit with it. He stopped drinking and using drugs for three months. -A predefined period- Difficult, the group pressure of a drunken group is enormous, partly because they have forgotten you don't drink anymore. So they keep supplying you beer. However swim managed it. It was interesting, though. But swim believes it is annoying, when you never want to drink alcohol again.

Cocaine is a different kind of stuff. Swim doesn't get dependent on it (yet), however if swim's life is going really good and he has some kind of victory moment, he just wants coke ... to boost the feeling. After such a occasion, he has some left and he is able to not touch it for a month or two, however throwing it away seems to be not done.

Tramadol, he felt sick and shaky. Swim first thought he had caught the flu for a couple of days. His supply ran out. It wasn't too bad. Swim thinks he was lucky. He needed 500> mg of tramadol a day. Nothing scary happened. It is strange, because swim never have problems with other opiates, only tramadol. He had those electric shocks, when he stopped.

[wann]

Nicotine, without a doubt. Trying to quit always drove me insane. Somehow I managed to quit fairly easily this last time (nearly 6 months now with 1 screw-up a couple of months ago). However, being around smokers or even just seeing an ad will give me a few hard moments.

Perhaps things could have been different if certain other drugs had been just as easily available to me as tobacco was.

[yaba]

Swims main struggle was with yaba (meth) and heroine but nicotine was hard to. Yaba nearly killed him and he had to move from Amsterdam to get away from it ! Where he is now there is no yaba.

Heroine is second swim been on it a few times from the age of 13.. And even now sometimes he is naughty..


When he is in Thailand he will go back to using yaba and alprazolam (he can't deal with the comedown anymore) But when he is at home he is back to normal again..

Or what he calls normal.

[gmeziscool2354]

alcohol, its impossible to get away from it, atleast here in the states,

[Pringles]

For swim it has to be nicotine. mj for him is a piece of cake along with alcohol. Giving up the last two didn't mean I'm strong, it was easy, that tells swim theres more to it than the substance itself. Old nic(otine) has had me by the curlies many times.

[Alfa]

This is an interesting poll. with 470 people voting it already gives good insight. I find it remarkable that cannabis scores higher than alcohol.

To bad that many other drugs like GHB, antidepressants, DXM, Ketamine, etc have not been listed. Adding them now would give a false result, because already listed drugs have received a lot of votes.

Maybe we need a new poll, that lists a great number of drugs. It would actually be best if one would be able to quantify the addictive qualities of each drug, between 1 and 5.

[Spare Chaynge]

Benzos were the worse. Seizures, paranoia from lack of, mo ped crashes ever other day ect ect.

Opiates addiction was easy compared to benzos...

[Stradivarius]

Hector enjoys being high.Dxm, alcohol whatever as long as he's high.
But he seems to get addicted to alcohol because he enjoys it too much.Euphoria is awesome! If he's inside his home and he feels like partying it's because he hopes he'll get drunk.When he's out and hasn't had atleast 1 beer it's like everything sucks and is so so boring.He has a feeling of acomplishment if he gets home at 5 am hammered.
Cigarettes are just something he rarely uses inbetween drinks.
Dxm nausea has made him cut back on it.Also the high is not good for being out and stuff like that.It's more of a "bed" high.
Hector is glad he can't get the hard stuff (coke,h,meth,k etc.) because he's sure he'll abuse those like crazy.

[missparkles]

Sparkles first addiction was the worst...diazepam. But opiates has to be "up there" to be honest. Benzo W/D has always been more difficult for Sparkles, sometimes lasting months, and the after effects of quitting can be horrendous for a very long time after stopping.
Sparkles thinks benzo's are seen as quite mild drugs, compared to heroin, and they get dismissed by people who equate quitting any drug with the rep it gets from the media.
Heroin is such a life destroying drug that's also illegal, so it must be more difficult to quit than something legitimately prescribed by Sparkles doctor.
Take care.
Sparkles.

Reputation Comments on this post:

Thank you for pointing out the benzos.

[violentcheetah]

[QUOTE=missparkles;651128]
Sparkles thinks benzo's are seen as quite mild drugs, compared to heroin, and they get dismissed by people who equate quitting any drug with the rep it gets from the media.
QUOTE]


Thank you. Im working on that right now. Its been 2 months. I was taking 50mg a day with focalin for 3 years. I loved it. I miss it so much. Ugh!

[missparkles]

Originally Posted by violentcheetah

Thank you. Im working on that right now. Its been 2 months. I was taking 50mg a day with focalin for 3 years. I loved it. I miss it so much. Ugh!

2 months...that's awesome love...bloody well done.
Like you Sparkles loved the feeling when she first took them. She was no longer scared of everything, she felt relaxed and could cope with every situation she found herself in.
But in such a short time she needed larger doses, and the side effects from large benzo doses (as swiy possibly knows) is worse than the anxiety they're supposed to cure.
Sparkles isn't sure...she thinks it's called rebound anxiety.
She went from benzo's to alcohol to heroin. Such a short journey from the first to the last.
And the consequences have taken a lifetime to deal with. Sparkles often wonders if her life might have been different if she hadn't been given that first 5mg of Valium?
Sparkles apologises to swi violentcheetah...she got carried away...yet again.
She sympathises with the love/hate benzo addiction, it is the hardest thing she's ever had to quit, much harder than heroin. And benzo's are the one drug that could lead her back to heroin addiction. Awful fuckin drug. She hopes swiy manages to overcome it, she really does.
Take care.
Sparkles.

[Spucky]

For my Cat Base/ Crack have been the right Killer,
"Base" killed her financial and intellectual.

She has a Morphine-Addiction for 25 Years and never went so low
like the short Time on Crack.
(18 Month 24/7)

There was no Limit, no way to think rational.

For her there was no peaceful Way out,
only a kind of a violent Abduction safed her from a total destruction.

Even now, if she smell something like Cocaine her Mind start to work in a Way she don`t like,
this is total different than Opioids.

[SusAngelo]

swim chooses MJ because swim smokes everyday and has a hard time quitting

[EyesOfTheWorld]

Despite the fact my lab monkey is currently in an awful state of dopesick/benzo WD, he'd have to say alcohol. He's got it under control now, maybe drinks once a week, now, for instance, but for well over a decade it ruled his life before he gradually replaced it with heroin and xanax. Honestly he feels the alcohol is much worse, health-wise.